


dead things

by streimel



Series: Gamble the World On You (Blackjack) [8]
Category: Infinite (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire Slayer, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-01
Updated: 2015-11-01
Packaged: 2018-04-29 08:08:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5121119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/streimel/pseuds/streimel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>His first hunt almost ends up with him dying, which, he supposes, he might have guessed would happen anyway.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>Sungjong gets a little more than he asks for when he meets a vampire and Nam Woohyun in a dark alley (and frankly, he's not sure which one is deadlier).</p>
            </blockquote>





	dead things

**Author's Note:**

> tw: blood, gore, violence
> 
> happy halloween, y'all

"I'm going to the bathroom," he yells in Woohyun's right ear, straining to be heard over the bass of some shitty EDM song everyone's too drunk to apparently find fault in. Woohyun squints as if he's not sure what he said before nodding in understanding, and as the crowd moves around them, Woohyun pulls him in a little closer, hand sliding over his jacket up to his waist before squeezing deeply once. He lingers, just enjoying the atmosphere (despite this shitty song), just him and Woohyun in their own little world for the moment before he breaks to move away.

"Sungjong!" Woohyun yells, and he can just make out the 'Jong', but Woohyun pulls him back by the wrist, yanking his head down to put his lips intimately close to his ear. "Don't talk to any strangers. You never know what types are in these places. Soft-looking people like you are always the ones they try first."

He knows the look he gives Woohyun is deadly, because Woohyun just laughs, wide-mouthed, like he always does, and he jerks back his wrist with enough force to make Woohyun trip forward. He's anything but soft, and he's tempted to remind Woohyun later just how particularly not soft he is. But for now, another dangerous look will suffice.

The bathroom is mostly deserted, one lone door closed in the mirror's reflection, and he pushes his hair this way and that way under the spotlight above the sink. It's limp against his forehead; someone in this place clearly doesn't believe in air conditioning. Behind him, there's a wet sound of mouth against skin, and he scrunches his nose in the mirror, tongue stuck out in faux disgust to no one but himself. Not that he hasn't seen it done in more humble locations, but he finds little romance on the inside of a bathroom stall showered with piss and vomit.

He rights the jacket a little, sighing as it sticks to his arms. Beauty from pain or something like that; under the circumstances, the ensemble isn't complete without it. He once overs in the mirror one last time, approving of how he looks with a firm nod to himself.

The stall door is surprisingly easy to kick in. He remembers him, Woohyun, and a rainy afternoon when they had snuck into some dilapidated building and Woohyun wouldn't let him leave until he could kick in every door without hesitation. "If you have to kick it two or three times," Woohyun had pushed ceaselessly, "you're basically saying 'please prepare yourself to kill me when I finally get this thing open.' Surprise is your best weapon. You need to be forceful. Extend from the knee. Get it together, Sungjong." Now he knows how to aim for the weak spots and which part of the foot should land first.

This time, there's little fuss; the door skitters open, arm thrown out to prevent the bounce-back, and he's ready, stake in hand. He stomps a boot down on its' back for good measure, making it arch into the floor, but there's barely enough time for it to think; it only takes a second to swing his arm down like a sledgehammer, hit the spot, and sink in. It disintegrates into a pile of blood and membrane, and he steps back from the puddle to spare his shoes.

The girl sitting on the toilet doesn't move; drugged, she's probably barely aware of anything that's happened since he watched her be escorted off the dance floor ten minutes ago. The whole club is - the drinks are spiked, the music is just a little too loud to hear what's going on, and it's too hot (for a human, at least). It's discouraging, because while he's made the rounds for a while now, cracking down on attacks at clubs and the streets, this is the first time he's seen such a well-organized order of business. They're getting smarter, gaining power, planning these things top to bottom. Someone is getting access to the top and running this, and that's a real problem for people like him. For the whole city, really.

Somewhere in the back, the door opens, and Woohyun joins him in his assessment of the situation at hand.

"What a mess. Everyone in this place is gone. I'm just surprised the whole thing was only set up by seven of them," Woohyun says with just a hint of annoyance, and he shoots him a confused look.

"How do you know there were seven?"

"Well, you just took down one, and I staked the two bartenders, the DJ, and ran up to VIP and got the other three who were running this thing while you were checking yourself out in the mirror."

He ignores the dig (because they both know it's true anyway), correcting him with an air of loftiness that originates from the sheer source of pride he cannot stop.

"Eight."

"Who else?" Woohyun asks, looking up.

"One standing guard at the bathroom door."

"Well well well, looks like we've got the makings of a real live vampire slayer! Look at you, two all by yourself. I'm very proud, Sungjong." Woohyun's face is a weird sort of genuine he never really shows, and he picks at his fingernails, suddenly unsure how to handle Woohyun being both sincere  _and_  complimentary without a seeming ulterior motive. He mumbles something about getting out of here and letting the other slayers in town know about what they've found, and Woohyun throws an arm around his shoulder with a laugh, leading him out of the bathroom and down a back hallway.

"We're not going to help them?" he says as he follows Woohyun out a fire exit, and Woohyun jumps over the railing to the street with an ease he can't quite manage himself.

"Nope. Cops will do it when they get here."

"When did you call the cops?"

"While you were worrying over the heat making your hair damp."

He heavily debates putting to good use his recent acquisitions in the combat department right here in the alley, but suffices with rapping his knuckles against the back of Woohyun's head and leaving him standing there to whine about the injustice.

* * *

That's where this whole thing had started.

Not in this specific alley. He probably couldn't find it again (the details were a little hazy, if he were being honest), but he at least remembers leaving a party that Jiyoung had dragged him to with the intent of getting back to the train station he had come through but being temporarily waylaid when the overwhelming urge to puke his guts out while simultaneously piss his pants had hit him. So he had discreetly stepped into the nearest alleyway to not-so-discreetly divest himself of every last ounce of both his stomach and bladder, and the following thirty or so minutes had become fragmented in recollection, working out the residual hiccups before braving the train home.

People had passed by without much thought sent his way, tapering off as the night had turned into the transitional time of morning when seemingly the whole world slept. He hadn't kept track of them either, barely noticing anyone at all with even less attention spent to detail, much more distracted by the ever-growing split widening between the left and right hemispheres of his brain.

Perhaps he had noticed them to begin with because he had just reached the point of sobering up where almost everything made sense again in a vaguely fuzzy way, or perhaps it was just the off-puttingness of the way they walked, his hand wrapped around her upper arm like a vice. He had watched them go by from his space between a trash can and a pile of old crates; they had moved down a ways, far enough he could barely make out what the man had been saying, but it had been clear to his ears when he had strained, an unmistakable sound of a body falling into something light, maybe a bag of trash or a stack of boxes, and the following gasp of unpleasant surprise.

He wasn't by any means a hero; he fully understood the limits to his strength in a very honest way, but he also wasn't by any means a coward, either, and that had propelled him on to his feet. At first, he had thought to merely call out, scaring off anyone intending harm. Instead, he had been greeted with the sight of someone, something, mouth attached to the thigh of a woman fading fast, lines of blood running down to the ground from overflow. On one hand, the alcohol was still buzzing through him, enough to make him question his own perception of reality and fantasy, but there were only so many explanations to the scene before him, and none of them seemed to explain someone drinking blood from a woman's thigh in an abandoned alleyway. Pushed by a sudden need to protect, he had yelled "hey!", looking to draw away the attention of whatever is was and not having a single plan in mind what to do after that.

As if entranced by the feeding, it had paid him no mind until his boot connected with a set of very life-like ribs, and yet, it had rolled up with a un-humanlike speed, crouched on the ground, tarnished fangs bared with a hiss. In the back of Sungjong's mind, a fleeting word had tried to form, an idea he shook away, a foolish feeling in quick need of being resolved with the fact this thing was certainly not human, not completely. Frozen in dumbfounded shock, there was no moment to think as it lunged, quick as a viper and just as deadly. He had stumbled backwards, landing on his ass with a thud and a sense of impending doom.

In terms of sheer extraordinariness, this certainly was the defining moment of his life. It had been there, under his arm when he had landed - if it had been a newspaper, or an empty bottle, it's what he would have grabbed (and he would certainly be completely, irrevocably dead). His mind didn't have the time to think through a method of defense; it was dumb luck at all he had thrown up his arm, mostly in instinct, the woman's abandoned heel in hand as if that were some extra protection. Never in a million years could he recreate, the perfect timing in which his arm had propelled itself forward as the thing had reached him, impaling itself through the heart with animal-like speed on the stilleto of the shoe. Faster that that even, the speed in which it had dissolved simply into a pile of mush at his feet.

"Did you really just stake it with a stiletto?"

The presence of a stranger in front of him, crouched down to pluck the shoe out of his hand with a look of utmost surprise, was relatively the most normal thing that had happened in the last ten minutes; he had sat staring as the man had simply shrugged before moving away to examine the woman. Sungjong had watched as the man had called for an ambulance before dragging him up and away from the alley without protest on his behalf, like he knew  _exactly_  what he were doing. Like he had seen this before. Only after they had turned the corner, mystery man's hand pushing him forward at the small of his back, did his mind even question what the fuck just happened.

"Let me put it this way," the man had answered, not looking over his shoulder. "I take care of the dirty work, and they- well, I mean, really they take care of the  _dirty_  work, but you catch my drift. We have an understanding. We, the slayers, I mean, kill them, the vampires, and they, the city, clean up the scene and take care of the victims. Oh, and, by the way, I'm Woohyun."

Sungjong's introduction to Woohyun (and slaying, in general) went just like that, abrupt and confusing and life-changing all at the same time. One minute, laying amongst some trash in a dark alley trying to sober up, the next being welcomed into the "club" (an real place people actually referred to without a hint of irony) as the newest slayer in town, introduced as the guy who staked one with a stiletto.

In a way, going along with Woohyun was the pivotal moment of transition in his life, a pronounced break between who he had been and who he would become. Personally, he thought, overwhelming shock was probably to be held accountable, but a need for answers or an explanation or just  _anything_ , that had been enough to let Woohyun steer him through empty streets back to the 'hideout', as he would come to call (Woohyun would always point out they were  _not_  hiding, he would always point out they were not a club, either). Even more than that, however, was the understood notion is his mind this is what he was called to do.

"There's people born with the sense," Woohyun had explained. "It's passed down, a family thing. We sense when they are around us. Others aren't - they are brought in other ways. Like you."

Woohyun had the sense, passed down from his grandmother and her sister, who learned from their aunt, who learned from her father. Like observable human traits, Woohyun had said - it was there in the DNA, but not every member of the family got it. When no one in his father's generation had presented it, the family had been worried it had died out. And then Woohyun came along.

"So that's how you found me then," Sungjong had figured out in the middle of sparring practice with L, a sobriquet he guessed might have meant 'Loser' or 'Lame' (beyond his admittedly impressive skills in combat, the moment it turned off he crumbled in a bumbling, awkward mess of a man). Looking on, Woohyun had agreed he had stumbled upon the scene after sensing a vampire feeding.

"I feel their energy: I know when they are weak, feeding, angry. I could feel it from three blocks away, a fierce type of hunger, and then, right as I got to the street, it disappeared. Instead, I found you, with a shoe."

The shoe itself had been encased on the dining room/meeting table, a sort of mythical artifact, a talking piece to introduce the man himself and the way fate worked to bring about a new generation of slayers to protect the Earth. Sungjong realized he'd never had a choice; they all believed his destiny was to stumble into that alleyway a simple print ad designer and stumble out a protector of the living.

It had still taken him a while to finally give notice - staying up 'til 5 am learning the art of stake-wielding didn't mesh well with 7 am meetings at the office. Woohyun had pushed, in his own way, first insistently and then even more insistently, but he had to come to it on his own terms.

"How exactly am I going to survive?" he had pushed back, and Woohyun had looked all around them. It was true, that everything they needed seemed provided without question - the hideout itself belonged to no one, and yet no one ever minded paying rent or bills, not that he saw.

Later, when he moved into Woohyun's own apartment, he had learned it was the city - they maintained the slayers, as well as possible. He had laughed at first, the idea of living like pensioners while chasing around vampires the neighborhoods of the town, but Woohyun had been dead serious.

"If not us, then who? They aren't equipped to handle this, so we do it. You never heard of vampires before the alleyway, right? But they've always been here, and you've always been protected. Now, you protect the people who go about their life without ever having to fear. And they provide for us, because they're grateful."

He pondered that over his juk, and Woohyun was silent, too, letting it sink in.

"Protect the world around you," Woohyun had said, after a while, "and it will protect you."

* * *

His first hunt almost ends up with him dying, which, he supposes, he might have guessed would happen anyway.

It's two months before Woohyun even allows the idea; his boot camp is everyday, 14 hours of combat training and emergency first aid in case of vampire bite and a daily discussion on vampire mythology with Bora, a beautiful and charming woman he was also sure could kill him before he blinked. At first, the idea of spending an hour every day debunking notions of garlic strands and coffins had seemed a waste, better spent learning have to kick a stake through a vampire heart, but the more he got into it, the more it made sense.

"They're addicts," Bora says, "plain and simple. Like anyone else motivated by their addiction, drugs or alcohol or sex, they look normal on the outside, but their brain can only think in patterns of acquisition. 'Where can I get what I need next?' Your brain doesn't get it, unless you've been addicted yourself. So instead of thinking like them, you need to watch for the signs. They all leave a trace."

Legends of avoiding the sun aren't true, he learns, but it came about because attacks rarely happen in the day. Like any violent attack, Bora says, they want to avoid being seen. People don't usually get mugged in the middle of the day, because there are too many witnesses. Things like that.

It's torture, waiting for his time to come. Woohyun goes out alone, and it kills him until he gets back. Woohyun had explained his need for a partner, only because of the way he sensed them.

"It's like white noise, or static," Woohyun says, sitting in on his discussion with Bora when she brings up the subject. "Basically, once I catch a drift and approach it, it fills my head. It can be overwhelming."

"Don't let him run into traffic, is what he's saying," Bora explains. "It's hard for the sensers to notice their surroundings and the dangers they might pose when they are in the proximity of a vampire. He'll move based on their emotions, so just keep him out of trouble."

It's easier said than done. Woohyun leads him out into the city as the late night comes on, but there are still plenty of people around. Potential victims, as Woohyun says, and he starts to see it, too. They're out there, the vampires, looking to feed, and any of these people could be next. They mill around for almost an hour, until suddenly Woohyun turns on his heel, rushing past him at almost a jog. He pushes through a crowd, trying to keep up, and Woohyun disappears into a forest at the far side of the intersection, deaf to Sungjong calling out his name.

Sungjong doesn't attempt to be quiet as he breaks through the bushes; he knows now a feeding vampire's tunnel vision on their prey drowns out almost everything else, a weakness he's learned to manipulate. Woohyun's somewhere ahead, and he tries to follow a path as best as possible, tripping over tree roots in the process. He calls out again, pondering the similarities between the vampire's tunnel vision and the flaw of Woohyun's own.

He senses it a moment too late, mind only processing something out the corner of his eye after he's walked past, but it's enough time to not be surprised when his body rips back, hitting something solid and cool. It's arms are around him like a vice, limiting his reach for the stake tucked in his belt, but he remembers not to panic. He swings a foot back, aiming at a shin, and they tumble to the side, ramming into a tree. The lock on his arms remains just as tight, but the noise of their scuffling echoes against trees and rocks, a massive crescendo rising up when he rears his head, feeling a crunch against the back of his skull.

A sick, eerie feeling sinks in when the body behind him stops moving. He flails his head, catching a rock wall behind him; the monster doesn't move, and after a moment, he feels the edging of a smashed nose, cool and unbreathing against his neck. He's stuck, kicking legs hitting stone and nothing else, and  _where the hell is Woohyun_? If they were in a pack, Woohyun could have easily taken out one or two more and been here by now. The potential Woohyun couldn't survive it grows by the minute.

A hint of fangs drags across a thumping vein in his neck, and he goes bezerk, pushing his body weight forward, trying to drag them down. It remains steady, and he knows it can smell his growing dread. Woohyun's dead, he's going to be dead, all that work for nothing and what the hell are they going to tell his parents? A vampire fucking  _ate_  him? He never asked Woohyun what they tell the families of the victims, and that seems like the worst part of all.

Strands of hair brush against his face when the vampire's head snaps up, and he sees Woohyun standing there, 5 meters away, looking like an apparition haunting the forest. A streak of blood stands out angry across his white shirt, highlighted as the clouds part to reveal the moon, and there's a deadliness about him Sungjong's never seen. He's so calm, so still, like he's not even real, but it's a comfort; Sungjong knows he'll figure this out.

That is to say, he'll figure out this conundrum they're facing. Wedged between the rockwall and Sungjong's bigger body, the vampire is about as safe as it can relatively be when facing up against a slayer who brought the family name back into the legends of the protectors of the living. Sungjong is a human shield, blocking all the points of weakness Woohyun would need to go for, and he knows the vampire knows they're safe.

A mouth lingers on his neck, but he knows it won't bite down; if it starts feeding, the distraction will be too much to prevent Woohyun's attack. It's a catch-22 - the vampire can't let go if it hopes to survive, and yet, there's the temptation, of blood and certain death if it gives in. Woohyun hasn't moved at all, and Sungjong knows why. While the vampire won't drain him, nothing's stopping it from just snapping his neck and calling it a night.

In a different situation, he knows Woohyun would want to call all the shots, and, in a different situation, he'd let him. In his practices, Woohyun's words had been repeated like a slogan, "listen to me. You don't know what you're doing. Listen to me. Don't do something stupid." It was something he hadn't mistaken as arrogance. Woohyun had this in his blood;  _he_  got lucky and didn't die because he fell on a shoe. And he had had every intention to follow Woohyun's orders, to watch and learn, but that was all before his options were to die or die even quicker. He'd apologize to Woohyun later for the insubordinance.

His sign is a nod of his head down, and he does it twice before Woohyun notices the movement. Woohyun's head cocks ever so subtly, as if not understanding, and it only clicks a millisecond before he moves. He hears a panicked "no!" before both of his feet leave the ground and slam into the space between the vampire's legs, pushing off the rockwall and propelling them forward like a falling tree. Then, he only hears the slam of the earth against his body, a rustling of leaves underfoot as Woohyun runs, and the death rattle of a disintegrating vampire as it melts around his body.

He knows he's not dead. He knows he's not dead because he can feel the trickle of goop slide down his neck. He knows he's not dead because he can feel the wound in his back where Woohyun's stake went clean through the vampire into him. He knows he's not dead because Woohyun's fingers are biting in his arm when he yanks him up. Woohyun is  _pissed_ , but he's also not dead, so Woohyun can shove it.

In a strange way, the adrenaline makes him question it though, if only because he feels like he's unreal, like he's ascended into some other plane of existence. His blood is rushing so fast it doesn't even feel like his heart is beating, just surging it through, and he can't speak. He can't speak, and neither can Woohyun apparently, who's mouth hangs open before him without making a sound. And then it crashes down on his, but he's not surprised.

He's not surprised, because he feels it, too; the slide out from under the crushing hand of death, watching the great abyss grow at your feet and suddenly being ripped back away. He's seeking a brutal assurance he's alive, he's human, he's whole and this is real and he's okay and that's all within the way Woohyun's mouth seals itself to his. It's warm and comforting and he can feel the blood rushing in Woohyun's lips because of the force and it's everything he needs right now. There's fucking vampire slime running down his back and he's pretty sure Woohyun ripped one of his muscles with the damn stake but none of it matters right now, because the disgusting gloop adhering to his shoulder blades and the burn of his tear and Woohyun's desperate, bruising kiss are infinitely better than being vampire bait.

"You're so dumb," Woohyun mutters against his lips, "so fucking dumb, didn't I tell you to listen to me, it could have killed you just because, god, you're so fucking stupid, my god, I thought I was going to lose you, I had no idea how I was going to get you away from it, I'm so angry at you, oh my god, Sungjong."

He's not one for clinginess, but he'll let Woohyun cling all night, standing here under the moon, if it means he never has to feel this way again. Woohyun kisses him again, this time less afraid and more insistent, and it moves him off the edge a little more. He lets Woohyun drag him away again, through shadows and behind buildings away from curious eyes, looking like a serial killer with blood from head to toe, and he doesn't even protest when Woohyun strips him down and pushes him headfirst into a freezing shower (rule #45 from training: remove blood with cold water - it works better). He watches the mucus and red circle the drain, feeling Woohyun's big fingers wash it out of his hair. The blood runs off him and he's reborn again, a new man, and he thinks about that while looking at Woohyun's scarred, gnarled hands wrapped around his waist. Born into a new life, initiated and found worthy like those that had come before him.

For the first time in a long time, he feels really, really real.

* * *

"So what you're saying, is that they're organizing these things now, from the top? You said they had everything controlled, right?"

"Basically."

" _Shit_."

Junghoon slides off his glasses , dropping them on the table to pinch the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger. Sungjong doesn't often interact with the top-level management around here, so being present for this meeting is something unfamiliar and discomforting. Junghoon had looked at him for further input, and he had kept his mouth shut; he still wasn't sure what to make of this.

Woohyun is sitting silently next to him, mood given away by the nail picking at his lower lip in agitation. If he had been told at the beginning this is who he'd fall for, he would have laughed. Woohyun lives every moment of his life between the states of hunting and preparing to hunt, and he knows Woohyun is going to think about this, 24/7, until it's resolved. They're getting smarter, and Woohyun won't sleep until he's figured out a way to stop them from advancing.

"Even parasites mutate," Woohyun muses, and he and Junghoon hum in agreement. There's nothing to do but canvas Hongdae, going into every club, seeking out every sense until they are all eradicated. What they do every night, only with more alertness. He doesn't want to think on it too much, but if it hadn't been for their presence, countless people would have been dead, simple as that.

Junghoon dismisses them to convene with the leaders of the other districts, and they walk home as the sun rises, silence overshadowed by the overwhelmingness of their own thoughts. On one hand, there's little that will change - Woohyun will still sense them, just like always, and then they'll hunt them down. Still, the more subtle they are, the better they are at hiding their traces or luring their victims in, the more people are going to die before they can find them all out.

Woohyun heads straight for the bedroom, and he passes by the vacant room in which he used to sleep, following him in. Though both avoided blood this time, they still shower to wash away the remnants of the night, the tainted feeling that always follows an encounter with the undead. They head to bed without a word, blackout curtains helping trick their minds into relaxing as the sun sets in the sky. They'll rest now, like the vampires they hunt, and wake when the world turns dark and deadly.

* * *

His dream melts into awareness at the sensation of teeth against his neck, but it's alluring, exhilarating. The blood-red numbers of the clock on the nightstand say 1:17, a few hours before he'll need to be up, but Woohyun's body is insistent and questioning against his, and he wants it, too. The darkness of the room, a total absence of light, makes everything seem so much more intense.

Everything is searching hands, lips, parts they both know like the back of their own hands, but still explore like they're new. He sweats easily, more easily than Woohyun, but Woohyun just draws his tongue along his collarbones, making him dig into Woohyun's hip bone in response. The intent was to be slow, but the need catches up too quickly, and Woohyun follows him down, letting himself be turned, opened, pushed to the edge.

It's too dark to see Woohyun's face, but he can feel everything he needs to know anyway. For someone so strong, resilient, and stubborn, Woohyun doesn't live except to provide gratification; he doesn't know the limit he could try, and sometimes, he doesn't want to. So, he's not rough, words and hands and body gentle and grateful, reassuring and giving back tenfold. Woohyun's curled like a ball under him, and he spreads long fingers down Woohyun's body, opening him up to his love and affection.

He finishes first, only so the awareness spreads in Woohyun's mind until he's wild and whimpering, and he sees him through, kissing him again and again and again as they come down off the high. Mind filled with a little more lucidity in the afterglow, Woohyun turns self-conscious in his neediness, distant and still on his turned side until he wraps an arm around his waist and draws him back down to chase a few more hours of sleep. The tenseness melts, and Woohyun kisses the knuckles of the hand across his chest; when he does that, Sungjong feels like everything will be okay, no matter what happens.

* * *

The stage is the same; only the scenery looks different. It's too hot, loud, close, and Woohyun's erraticness in the middle of it all lets him know there are many more than eight here tonight. He manages to text Howon and Sungyeol for back-up, but they're clearing out their own club two blocks away, and there's no guarantee when they'll arrive. Instead, he has Woohyun wrist in his hand, mouth to mouth as his only distraction.

"Pay attention to me, Nam Woohyun," he says, and Woohyun is muttering against his lips, taking notes on where they are, the DJ, the girl handing out shots to people by the bar, the man under the vodka sign. His tongue slips past Woohyun's teeth, and that gets a response. Jamming his hand down Woohyun's pants amidst the chaos on the dance floor isn't exactly his idea of a good time at the moment, but he'll do anything to keep Woohyun from going off right now.

Even his attention is being pulled away, however. People are being led off the dance floor, headed towards the VIP lounge and the bathrooms, and he knows they're feeding when Woohyun tears away, swinging into a group of people too far gone to notice. He just manages to grab hold, and he knows he can't stop Woohyun now, not alone.

"Where?"

"VIP. There's a bunch - they're...a lot. Feeding."

Woohyun flies when he lets go, and he says a silent prayer, headed toward the bathroom. Even if there are a few there, they should be feeding, and he's well-trained enough to protect himself now. He stumbles down the deserted hallway, acting like a drunk in desperate need of a toilet. The guard at the door calls out, turning him away with a warning about the bathroom being out of order, and he bows over, as if to vomit. It makes a move, perhaps thinking him an easy target in his fabricated inebriation, but it's not so difficult to swing his leg low, tripping it at the ankle and landing on top, stake sinking in in a moment. He doesn't know how many he's picked off now, maybe ten, or fifteen, but he's always made it seem easy. So far, it has been.

The first four stalls are occupied; it takes him only moments to kick the doors in, vampires destroyed in a moment. Bora had mentioned the turnover rate was high - like flies, a majority living less than a few weeks, but able to reproduce a whole next generation within that time. The man in the first stall is completely drained, skin looking pallid and sallow. The options are slim; once drained, there's a 75% chance the victims are turned themselves, and he wishes Woohyun, or literally anyone else, were here to guide him morally. The stake weighs in his hand, turning over and over as a nervous habit while he looks at the lifeless body. It feels like a sin to stab his stake through the heart, and when the man doesn't dissolve, it makes his stomach turn. He consoles himself with the fact it's better to do this now, and not tomorrow when when this man is draining someone else. What's left instead is a gaping wound on an already abused body. He lets the door swing shut to the stall, feeling sick.

He hears nothing else, but there's a big stall at the end of the bathroom that remains closed. He aims the heel of his boot for the lock, aiming the extension of his knee take the brunt of the impact, but it doesn't come. The door comes open before his foot falls, and the force of his momentum slams him into the ground, breathless at the shock. A great hissing sound makes the hair on his arms and neck rise, and he's slammed up against tile wall before he can move to protect himself. Cold, impossibly strong fingers crush his windpipe, and only a well-placed kick sets him free. The vampire's on a blood high, a euphoric, deadly trip, and he barely manages to dodge a grab for his neck again.

A kick to his stomach sends him flying towards the wall and his stake somewhere towards the door, and, as much as he hates to admit it to himself, he's completely fucked. Now, there are no stilettos, no broken tree branches, no chopsticks. There's him and this berserker of a monster, trance-like in their fury, and the realization he will die announces itself, whispering across his mind.

 _They tell them the truth_ , Woohyun had said, when he finally asked what happened to the victims.

"They, the city, you know, they cremate the bodies, and give that to the families. Obviously it's not ideal, but it's either that or staking the poor people a few times to ensure they don't come back." It had been so casual, so obvious, he almost couldn't believe it.

"And they don't worry? That people will start talking about it?"

"Not really. I mean, people do, of course. But everyone else thinks they're just being crazy. It's just...too unreal. It doesn't fit in with people's world view. Vampires are scary, spooky things in horror movies alongside werewolves and zombies. Would you have believed it, either? Before this?" He had agreed that, no, he wouldn't have believed it either.

He wonders what his parents will think, then. Will Woohyun explain? His parents still think he works 7-7 slaving over ad contracts; will they accept what he became when he's gone? Will they be angry he never told them the truth? It doesn't matter, and he doesn't have time to dwell on it at the moment.

It happens like this: the vampire lunges, and he slides down the wall, curling into himself. The arm thrown up offers him no protection - it's instinct, pure and simple. He feels a jolt in the bones of his ulna and radius, and then the fire begins. A set of vampire fangs, dug clean into the muscle of his forearm, and he sees the venom mix with blood, running in streaks down his arm. Then, it's just screaming, something he can't help, because it's  _hell_.

The vampire tries to jerk away, but the curves of the fangs are embedded in deep, and his vision goes white at the edges as he almost floats away. Some voice, maybe Woohyun's, maybe Bora's, is telling him to concentrate, and he pushes back, trying to remain conscious. His other hand flies up, wrenching the jaw attached to his arm and pulling it free, and he rocks his body forward, bringing his knees into the vampire's chest. There's a loud crack as skull hits tile floor, but it doesn't help him. Only way to beat the undead is to destroy, completely. A little fractured skull is nothing.

He manages to fall over on the stake when the vampire bucks him off, scrambling to his side to avoid the porcelain lid of the toilet as it lands where his head had just been. He scrambles under the space of the door, watching it off rip the wall as the vampire throws it open. He's wounded, weak, and overpowered a hundred times over. But he still has a will, and a brain that can out think this beast, and he's not quite ready to give up, yet.

It swoops down, grabbing for him, but he evades it again. It's getting slower as it churns through the blood, depleting the tank it needs to keep going, and he slides into the only empty stall, locking the door and just hoping it will take a moment to rip off this door so he can think. It tries the door, yanking out instead of pushing in, and the hinges resist. It's a brief reprieve, and he backs up as far as possible as it fights with the door.  _How's your impaired critical thinking, fucker_? he thinks to himself, waiting for it to realize it has to force it in, not out.

His own critical thinking skills aren't helping him so much, however. The only thing he can think to do is die, and it's not the preferred options. The burning in his arm doesn't exactly help - he knows the muscle is dying because of the venom, and that's a distractingly terrifying concept. He flexes it against the floor, stretching to test the limits, and his fingers bump a box besides the toilet. It's damp, an abandoned cigarette box undoubtedly fallen from someone's pants or purse, and he ponders a last cigarette, just to say he'd tried it once. The box has weight when he picks it up, but not from the cigarettes - there are only a few left. No, something's watching out for him from above, because there's a fucking  _lighter_  tucked in the empty space of the box.

He flicks it once, feeling panicked when it doesn't ignite, and finally, finally, there's a flame. The stupid vampire still hasn't figured out the door, or lacks the energy to force it, and he holds his breath as he extends his arm under the door, flame tilted toward the pants of the thing. It takes a moment, for it to catch and then crawl; he doesn't see past the shin, but he smells the flesh as it begins to burn. It doesn't apparently realize it's on fire for another moment, because then the screaming starts, and he covers his ears at the horrific sound of it all, so human even though he knows it's not. Not any more.

It seems like an eternity before someone or something else comes, but he recognizes Sungyeol's "Jesus fucking Christ" in an instant. He manages to get the door unlocked and open, but that's about all he can manage.

"Fuck, man," Sungyeol says when he looks him over, reaching for the anti-venom in his jacket. "I don't envy whoever the hell has to clean this shit up." The needle hurts as bad as the fangs did, but at this point, he's beyond caring. He sinks back into the wall, and Sungyeol fills him in in the meantime.

"Woohyun's okay," Sungyeol begins. "He got bit on his shoulder. Do you guys not carry this shit with you? The scientists fucking made it for us, you know?" He's having a hard time concentrating, but he thinks he hears Sungyeol mutter "cocky assholes" to himself as he wraps a bandage around his forearm. He feels like an idiot when Sungyeol lifts him up, but everything starts fade, and he doesn't fight it. Sungyeol carries him across the deserted dancefloor on their way out. Sungyeol's still talking, saying something about twenty vampires, and it must be true, because Bora and L and Junghoon are here, and that just doesn't make sense to him.

Woohyun's passed out in the car Sungyeol deposits him in. He half-heartedly shoves his shoulder, trying to rouse him, but Howon warns it's worthless. Woohyun looks as bad as he imagines he looks at the moment, bloody and bruising, with the left shoulder of his shirt ripped to reveal a puncture wound that will certainly scar, but they're both alive, and he can't complain about that.

* * *

Woohyun tears him a new asshole when he recounts his fight in the bathroom, and he doesn't argue, because he knows Woohyun's just being an ass to not cry (and when that happens, he draws him in, letting him sob into his shirt until it settles into little sighed hiccups.) Woohyun mumbles he's proud of him, even if he is an obstinate asshole, and he mentions he had good teachers.

"The best," Woohyun corrects, and they both laugh.

And so life continues. They still sleep while the world is awake, are awake while the world sleeps, living life in between shadows and protecting those who will never even know to thank them. The city buys them a car, to thank them for the dedication to preserving the safety of the living, and he has a hell of a time explaining how he afforded it to his parents. Woohyun pesters him for a puppy, and he wonders if this is what his life was meant to be, chasing vampires with Nam Woohyun, a ruthless slayer who keeps leaving pictures of cocker spaniel puppies around the apartment.

"Who's going to watch it when we're out hunting vampires for ten hours every night?" he asks over ice cream, watching the sun go down on Seokchon. Woohyun shrugs in a way the means he obviously hasn't thought too much about logistics, he just wants it  _now_.

"Boohyun'll do it," Woohyun says, and he rolls his eyes, wishing he could develop Woohyun's tendency to act before thinking, just to see how Woohyun would like it.

He watches a walk by, a big sister pushing the baby as her parents amble on behind her, but when he turns to point it out the Woohyun, the seat next to him on the bench is occupied by an upturned double scoop of chocolate chip ice cream. Woohyun is standing still a distance away, head turned in the direction a mostly abandoned trail, and he tenses up for a moment.

"Come on!" Woohyun yells as he breaks into a run, and his body fulfills his previous wish, chasing after him before he even thinks. This is what he's chosen for himself, and he'll come when he's called.

**Author's Note:**

> I used to be obsessed with Buffy, then Twilight (l o l high school...what a time), then Sookie Stackhouse Novels/True Blood...
> 
> you catch my drift.
> 
> (I'm still obsessed with Buffy)
> 
> I really like vampire stories but I never had an interest in writing one. Hopefully this didn't suck.
> 
> I finished editing this just right now @ 2 am so lol if it's shit near the end my bad


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